


1183

by anthiese



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Implied/Referenced Character Death, kinda shippy, mid timeskip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:27:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23170180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anthiese/pseuds/anthiese
Summary: Hubert had served three future Emperors.He didn't know all of their names.
Relationships: Edelgard von Hresvelg & Hubert von Vestra
Comments: 8
Kudos: 43
Collections: Bread Eaters, Those Who Drabble in the Dark





	1183

**Author's Note:**

> i was originally gonna write something toying with the theory/idea that the Hresvelg siblings never existed, but it went a bit off rails! this was also originally a fill for Sera's prompt for Those who drabble in the dark a couple weeks ago-- "heaven and hell" though that also went a bit off rails... nonetheless, enjoy!

He’d been brought to a princess in Horsebow Moon. Her hair was dark, her eyes so light, and she was so very tall—or at least, that’s what it had felt like. Hubert had been told her name, but he’d forgotten it, the way he’d forgotten what her face looked like. 

“You are her servant,” his father had said. “You must protect her with your life.” 

Hubert had nodded. 

He didn’t know what the princess had said. He did know she must’ve had a Crest, for she was the third child, and yet the first in line for the throne. 

Nothing else mattered, really. 

“The first was Merewyn.” Edelgard told him when he asked. “My eldest sister.” 

Her white hands were dirty with charcoal as she scraped something on the canvas, in sharp, clean movements. It reminded him of his own. 

“Lady Merewyn.” Hubert repeated. “Merewyn von Hresvelg.” 

It rolled nicely off his tongue; it felt like a princess’s name. 

Edelgard nodded, her face still focused on her drawing. The sun behind her. 

Hubert stared at the back of the canvas, and he saw the shadows that grew against the black, followed the trail of her hand. His lips started to part. 

“I don’t blame you.” Edelgard spoke before he could. “If you’ve forgotten what she looked like. It was long ago.” 

“I believe I was five.” Hubert said. 

“Nineteen years... That is some people’s lifetime.” She put down the charcoal. “Her lifetime.” 

Hubert looked up to her face, pale, unaffected as it is. Edelgard met his eyes, gestured for him to come closer, and he found himself at her side. On the canvas was a girl: dark straight hair, light eyes, a face he didn’t recognize—save for its affinity with Edelgard’s. 

“Quite enchanting.” He told her. 

“I always thought she was the most beautiful of us all. I wonder if she knew, in the end.” 

The corpse’s face looked back to him with a tinge of doubt, behind that air of delicately forged serenity. It was a face that had been forgotten, wiped off the earth’s memory, but not before it bled all of its tears under the eyes of the only soul left to remember her. 

Hubert could not help but doubt the heir to the throne had thought about her looks, when those ones started sharpening their tools. He doubted that little girl had thought about something like that, when the Death Knight had whisked her away into the laboratory. 

“She might have made a good emperor, were she born in peaceful times.” Edelgard went on. 

He nodded to those meaningless words. It was important that Edelgard smiled. When she looked back up to him, it was with kind eyes. 

“But everything is up to me, isn’t it? Hubert.” 

“Of course.” He replied. “I’ll lessen your burden as much as is in my possibilities.” 

That night the burdens consisted in bringing the Emperor’s supper to her chambers, lighting her candles and watching in silence as she drew another youthful face. 

Hubert returned to his chambers late at night, to a battle plan laid out on his desk. He pushed the papers aside, and wrote down a name on his journal. 

♤

During Guardian Moon he’d met a prince. The princess had needed to leave, Hubert had been told. He hadn’t been interested in the details, but thinking back, it felt strange to remember how easily he’d let her fade from his mind, in favor of the new, barely younger, crested prince. 

“You are Lord Authalf’s servant,” his father had said. “You must protect him with your life.” 

Hubert had looked up to the Emperor’s third son, to his dark eyes and cropped blonde hair, and the prince had nodded his head to him. 

He’d disappeared during the last day of the Pegasus Moon, while Hubert waited for him outside the Emperor’s solar. Hubert had waited until the sun was low and his father arrived, lifting him up and hiding his head in his neck, patting his back as if he’d been a child in need of comforting. 

He’d never mentioned the prince again, and on his part, Hubert had never thought or felt the need to ask. 

But his name was still there, right above that of the princess. People he’d known, and that were gone. 

“You’ve been asking about my family often, as of late.” Edelgard said, lowering her training axe. 

“Indulge me, if you will.” 

“Indulgence isn’t like you.” She laughed. 

Hubert shrugged, and helped her put on a cape, before following her back into her chambers, to sit on the large couch as he remembered doing with the Emperor’s daughter. 

“He was strong.” Edelgard said. “He survived the magic, the water... They thought they were so close, but it didn’t work. Then I was the only one left with a Crest. I remember father telling me I was his hope, the Empire’s hope... saying it was almost over.” 

Hubert raised an eyebrow. “It wasn’t.” 

“It wasn’t.” 

Edelgard leaned back, stretching her body, and he could see the bottom of her scar peek from where her shirt was lifted, right above her stomach. Hubert couldn’t tell if what he felt was the need to see more, or to cover it. Edelgard closed her eyes, and the silence was weightless, like the sigh she let out. 

“But is it ever, Hubert? _Will_ it ever?” 

He smiled, and closed his own eyes. 

“I shall be at your side to find out.” 

♤

It was the first day of the Lone Moon when he’d met the Emperor, according to the journal. 

The first memory was a small injury—a scholar practicing on the other side of the library, and magic had brushed her hand, taking but a few drops of blood, and she had cried. 

Father had looked upon him with eyes that his words couldn’t have described. It was the only time Hubert had seen him shaking. 

“You are Lady Edelgard’s servant.” He’d said, turning away from him. “You must protect her with your life. You cannot allow this to happen again.” 

Hubert hadn’t slept that night. He remembered looking at her in the morning, when she’d woken up and opened the door for him. She’d been a small thing, back then, with eyes wide and violet and dark like the sea, and he’d thought of how easily porcelain dolls break. 

“Uncle said you’re here to guard me,” she’d told Hubert, as he brushed her hair. “But we can still play together.” 

“I believe so.” Hubert had replied. 

“I don’t really need help, so it’s fine,” she’d said then. 

Hubert had nodded. 

He simply hadn’t been there when she needed help. He hadn’t let that thought haunt him, but he’d stashed it in his mind, as to not forget. 

That night the help consisted in finishing the preparations for the battle, and bringing the files to her room. Edelgard awaited on her chaise longue, beautiful and in red, a book in her hands. 

“What would I do without you.” She moved her legs away, inviting him to take a seat. 

“Wait for me to make my way back to you,” he replied as he sat beside her. 

She laughed. Hubert took off his gloves. 

“Sometimes,” she said, tracing a finger along his forearm, her eyes getting darker, “I almost wonder, if you would be living better without me. Or serving someone else—one of my siblings, those you were supposed to serve.” 

Hubert was silent. Edelgard’s head found his shoulder, the book laying forgotten on her lap. 

“I know it is silly of me to waste my breath with such thoughts.” She murmured. “Dead, forgotten people... Fates that couldn’t have come to pass.” 

He moved, his hands finding her cheek, fitting it against his palm like a missing piece. 

“You are a living thing.” Hubert told her. “The only thing that matters. My life is with you. My loyalty is with you, and it could not have been in any other way.” 

Edelgard’s eyes lit with a smile. Her hand found his, and she brought it to her lips. 

“I’ll make sure to keep it safe,” she whispered over the scarred skin. “As you do mine.” 

“As I always will,” Hubert corrected her. 

_Until the end of time,_ he didn’t need to say it. 

**Author's Note:**

> big thankies and hugs to bina @tangerinabina_de_archanea for the title and the support! love you!
> 
> if i've made you sad feel free to yell at me on my twitter or CC @anthieze!


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